NewEnglandLady
Ideal_Rock
- Joined
- Jul 27, 2007
- Messages
- 6,299
Hi, all. I need some of that irreplaceable PS insight.
For the record, I feel like most people tend to think of a woman as being either career-driven or family-driven. Not wanting to give up her career to have a family or really excited to be a SAHM. I don't fall into either category. I don't live for my career, nor do I feel like my crowning achievement in life is to have kids. For this reason, I feel very torn. I genuinely like working, but I'm also very open to being a SAHM and have been thinking about finding a job that would make it easy for me to have more balance in my life post-kids.
I have worked very hard to get where I am. In my early twenties I would have considered myself very career driven. I'm 29 now and while I do love to learn and be challenged, I don't love coming home from work so mentally exhausted that it takes all the energy I have to make dinner. I currently work for an advertising agency, which notoriously demands a lot of hard work and long hours. The culture here is to work hard, play hard. We have a beer tap on site. We have ping pong tournaments. We all wear flip flops and tank tops to work every day. But most people work 70+ hour weeks. And 90% of my colleagues are single and live in the city and live to work.
Basically, it's the kind of environment that would make it very hard for me to balance being a mom and working.
I interviewed for a position this morning that was very different. Small, local company. I'd still be a marketing analyst, but I'd be on the client side in a very traditional, conservative industry. It's slow-moving. The company is a decade behind the times. It's very, very different from the culture here. I worry about being bored, but I also think that working part-time at this company after having kids would be a real possibility. The full-time salary would be very similar to what I currently make--they would have to stretch the budget to meet my minimum, so I know there wouldn't be much of an increase at all.
This is where I'm stuck. I don't know what to do. D and I want to start TTC in 6 months to a year, so if I'm going to make a move I would like to do it soon. But taking a step back in my career goes against the grain for me (even as a non career-focused woman). Also, I'm trying to think about all of my possibilities. I may want to be a SAHM for a couple of years and if that's the case, I'd prefer to have my current company on my resume as my last employer since it's well-respected in the area. I'm also on the verge of a promotion here, which would be good for my resume.
So I'm stuck. Do I take a step back, risk being bored in the short-term in order to achieve long-term balance in my life after having kids (if I decide to continue working?) or do I stay in my current, challenging position and either keep looking for a better fit (something in between being bored and being exhausted) or stay indefinitely. I know that nobody can really tell me what is best, but I'd love to hear from other women who decided to take a step back and regretted it/liked it after kids or stayed in a demanding career and regretted it/liked it after kids?
Sorry for the novel!
For the record, I feel like most people tend to think of a woman as being either career-driven or family-driven. Not wanting to give up her career to have a family or really excited to be a SAHM. I don't fall into either category. I don't live for my career, nor do I feel like my crowning achievement in life is to have kids. For this reason, I feel very torn. I genuinely like working, but I'm also very open to being a SAHM and have been thinking about finding a job that would make it easy for me to have more balance in my life post-kids.
I have worked very hard to get where I am. In my early twenties I would have considered myself very career driven. I'm 29 now and while I do love to learn and be challenged, I don't love coming home from work so mentally exhausted that it takes all the energy I have to make dinner. I currently work for an advertising agency, which notoriously demands a lot of hard work and long hours. The culture here is to work hard, play hard. We have a beer tap on site. We have ping pong tournaments. We all wear flip flops and tank tops to work every day. But most people work 70+ hour weeks. And 90% of my colleagues are single and live in the city and live to work.
Basically, it's the kind of environment that would make it very hard for me to balance being a mom and working.
I interviewed for a position this morning that was very different. Small, local company. I'd still be a marketing analyst, but I'd be on the client side in a very traditional, conservative industry. It's slow-moving. The company is a decade behind the times. It's very, very different from the culture here. I worry about being bored, but I also think that working part-time at this company after having kids would be a real possibility. The full-time salary would be very similar to what I currently make--they would have to stretch the budget to meet my minimum, so I know there wouldn't be much of an increase at all.
This is where I'm stuck. I don't know what to do. D and I want to start TTC in 6 months to a year, so if I'm going to make a move I would like to do it soon. But taking a step back in my career goes against the grain for me (even as a non career-focused woman). Also, I'm trying to think about all of my possibilities. I may want to be a SAHM for a couple of years and if that's the case, I'd prefer to have my current company on my resume as my last employer since it's well-respected in the area. I'm also on the verge of a promotion here, which would be good for my resume.
So I'm stuck. Do I take a step back, risk being bored in the short-term in order to achieve long-term balance in my life after having kids (if I decide to continue working?) or do I stay in my current, challenging position and either keep looking for a better fit (something in between being bored and being exhausted) or stay indefinitely. I know that nobody can really tell me what is best, but I'd love to hear from other women who decided to take a step back and regretted it/liked it after kids or stayed in a demanding career and regretted it/liked it after kids?
Sorry for the novel!